A sustainable and enjoyable marriage
To enjoy doing certain things together – traveling alone together, for one
A healthy cash-flow
The freedom and safety to manage and enjoy a family
A satisfying career

I married my wife after we knew each other for about a year. Venus and Mars has a lot of differences and a happy marriage needs deeper understanding of each other, in order to help each other to achieve personal goals together.

Thank God I am blessed with all the above conditions except for the family thingy. We have been travelling quite often for job assignments in the past few years and having freedom to manage my family is really tough. However, my wife manage to switch to other dept. and cut down travelling by 75% one year after our marriage.
To fulfill all the above conditions is not easy. It requires very detail planning, a little bit of sacrifice and a lot of prayer. Some of my suggestion to get closer to the goals:

1. Cash flow planning: One of you will need to plan for cash flow. Be it husband of wife, the financial controller will need to know exactly what to do with the family income and be a gate controller.

2. Set family financial goals and carrots: No matter how much you make, a family will still suffer from financial crisis if there is no proper financial goals. Financial goals can be clearing up housing loan debt within X years, becoming Premier/Priority Banking member, opening your first gold account, or even accumulatig yor first million together. Joint Family Carrots is important to keep a family happy. Annual carrots such as a trip to Bali, NZ or a new Hi-Fi/TV set gives a family something to look forward to.

3. Wife- Be Selective of company you worked for, Husband- Be selective of career progression you looked for: A lot of women will opt for an easier, less stressful and more flexible job after getting married. However, such jobs normally doesn’t come with a lucrative income. This therefore cuts down the overall family income which might slow down the pace for a family to reach their financial goal. My advice to wives: look for a job in a flexible working environment MNC. MNCs allows greater flexibility for work-family tension management. Take your time to find a good paying job that fits into your career goal and flexibility requirements. There are plenty of such jobs in places like BT, DHL, Ericsson, Nestle, CP etc…For husband, plan your career path properly, discuss your career goals with your wife and get support from your wife to achieve your goals. You will find wife’s support boosting your self-confidence during your job seeking/entreprenuership cycle.

4. Set aside time for join activities: You will enjoy family the most doing something different with your partner together. For me, I always enjoy swimming, sun bathing and reading-by-poolside in a nearby clubhouse with my wife during weekends. It is very refreshing and relaxing for both of us to unwind after a week of working stress. Some couples enjoy jungle trekking, sports, food-tasting, joint cooking session, gardening etc.

5. Make your wife happy: I find that man are happier when their wife are happy. Buy a nice gift for your wife annually, something your wife wished for, probably an Coach handbag or a Longines watch. The gift symbolizes appreaciation of whole year long of life-sharing with you.

6. Joint Spiritual Goal: Serve with your wife in the same ministry and share your spiritual burdens. Pray a lot together on your personal goals. You will find God always listens to prayr and bless you with abundances.